1. Field of the Invention
The present invention provides an order supporting system, an order supporting method, and a recording medium, and more particularly to an order supporting system, an order supporting method, and a recording medium for supporting the ordering of supplies of machines.
2. Description of the Related Art
Inside an office of a company, numerous machines (apparatuses), such as a printer, a copy machine, a fax machine, or a multi-function machine having the functions of the foregoing machines, are connected via a network.
All the above-described machines include consumable supplies that are consumed when using the machines. The functions of the machines can be maintained by appropriately exchanging the consumable supply (hereinafter also referred to as “supply”). For example, a consumable supply for a printer may be a toner, a fixing unit, a disposal toner bottle, a photoconductor, or a developer.
For example, since it is difficult to determine the degree of consumption (wear) of the machines just by looking at the machines from the outside, the user is able to recognize shortage of a supply (in this example, toner) and the need to exchange the toner only when an error is reported to the user upon commanding a printing operation. In order to reduce the workload of the user, various methodologies are proposed. For example, there is a methodology of detecting the lifespan of a supply from the inside of the machine and indicating data of the supply on a control panel or printing out the data of the supply onto a sheet of paper. Furthermore, there is a methodology of reporting the need of exchanging a supply to the outside by transmitting signals and dispatching maintenance personnel to offices where the machines are installed.
In a case where ordering a supply or exchanging a supply is performed by the user itself when shortage of the lifespan of the supply is detected, the user is required to confirm the precise model number of the supply when ordering the supply. Therefore, the user must go through complicated procedures in order to order the supply. Furthermore, in a case of ordering a supply beforehand, the timing for ordering the supply may vary depending on business hours or business days of the sales office for receiving the order. Furthermore, in an ordering system where maintenance personnel are dispatched, there is a problem of increasing costs such as labor cost and delivery cost.